The son of an acclaimed psychiatrist at UC Irvine wants his father removed as overseer of the family partnership for allegedly losing more than $1.3 million in a Nigerian Internet scam.

Louis Gottschalk received an e-mail in 1994 asking him to assist purported Nigerian government officials or former officials who wanted to remove millions of dollars from the country, according to the lawsuit filed by Guy Gottschalk in Orange County Superior Court.

The psychiatrist e-mailed back and then transferred more than $1.3 million to the scammers’ accounts beginning in 1995. Guy Gottschalk said in court documents that he believes the amount was more than $3 million.

The psychiatrist, now 89, traveled to Africa in 1996 in hope of receiving the money he was promised, according to court records filed by Guy Gottschalk’s attorney.

“While it seems unlikely, even ludicrous, that a highly educated doctor like the defendant would fall prey to such an obvious con, that is exactly what happened,” Guy Gottschalk’s attorney, Fred Anderson, said in court records.

The professor declined to comment when reached at UCI on Thursday.

In a declaration filed in the case, he said he made bad investments and “was taken advantage of” in the 1990s. He also said that the family partnership was worth about $8 million and that his son unsuccessfully tried to have a conservator appointed to manage it in October.

Louis Gottschalk was married to Helen Gottschalk, who died in 1993, according to the suit. After she died, the Gottschalk Family Trust was split among family members into a partnership, the suit says.

A hearing asking for a preliminary injunction to immediately remove Louis Gottschalk from accessing money in the partnership is set for March 14.

Gottschalk joined UCI in 1967 as founding chairman of the Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior. His accomplishments include a study in 1988 that determined that then-President Reagan was not as mentally capable as earlier in his presidency. Reagan was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in 1994.

The lawsuit says Louis Gottschalk met with FBI agents in 1999 and told them he had been duped. Guy Gottschalk alleges that his father kept transferring money after the meeting.

In addition, the suit alleges the psychiatrist used the family fund as “his own personal piggy bank,” including paying for his meals at UCI’s University Club.

The scam has defrauded Americans of hundreds of millions of dollars, according to the U.S. Secret Service. Hundreds of people in Orange County have been duped, many of them elderly, Secret Service Agent James Kollar said.

Some arrests in Nigeria have been made, but the scam has lasted for years.

Kollar said that individuals typically lose from $500 to $1,000 and that he’s never heard of someone being scammed of more than $1 million.